That Castalian current,
Reciprocity, is not blocked!
By correspondence: beyond my eye
Lies, a larger reality.
Beyond calling, beyond seeing
Like a certain long la
Between my mouth and temptation
A mile of distance...
Blessed are the longitudes,
The latitudes of oblivions and strata!
Whose expanse moves into you
Like a note, like a moan
Prolonging itself in you,
Like an echo of a granite heart
Beating into you:
Don’t look and don’t listen and don’t be—
Not that I need it in black
And white—in chalk on a board!
Nearly beyond range
Of my soul, beyond range of ennui—
... As a literary conceit
The final card is dealt.
Expanse, expanse
Now you are—a blank wall!
Кастальскому току,
Взаимность, заторов не ставь!
Заочность: за оком
Лежащая, вящая явь.
Заустно, заглазно
Как некое долгое la
Меж ртом и соблазном
Версту расстояния для…
Блаженны длинноты,
Широты забвений и зон!
Пространством как нотой
В тебя удаляясь, как стон
В тебе удлиняясь,
Как эхо в гранитную грудь
В тебя ударяясь:
Не видь и не слышь и не будь —
Не надо мне белым
По чёрному — мелом доски!
Почти за пределом
Души, за пределом тоски —
…Словесного чванства
Последняя карта сдана.
Пространство, пространство
Ты нынче — глухая стена!
«The cold wind from a lagoon. / The silent coffins of gondolas. / I, in that night — so ill, and young so — / Had stretched myself against a lion. There on tower, with a song irony, / The giants tolls in that night hour. / Mark sank in the lagoon, all moonlit, / Iconostas, patterned...»
«There fades the boom of life, quite teasing, / And back is the affairs' tide. / But wind through a black velvet's singing / About the future and somewhere's life. Where shall I wake? In other country? / Not in this gloomy land, isn't it? / And won't I be just abundant / To recollect thi...»
«All on the earth will die — and youth and mother, / Wife will betray you, leave once faithful friend, / But you learn to enjoy the bliss another — / Look in a mirror of the polar land. Get on your bark, sail to the distant Pole / In walls of ice — and bit by bit forget / How they l...»
«I’m sick, for sure: deep darkness holds my heart, / I’m bored with the people and the stories, / And dream of treasures of the kingdoms, glories, / And yataghans, all covered with blood. It seems to me – and this is no fraud – / A Tartar, squint, was one of my begetters, / That fi...»